MrGatch

My Amex Gold Card claims to award 7,500 on card anniversary if I spend at least £15k.

Specifically:

Does anyone have any experience of this in practice? I was planning on getting rid of the card at the end of it's first year to avoid paying the annual fee and loosing the first year bonuses for groceries, travel etc.

Does the 7,500 bonus really take 2 months to apply to the account or in practice is this usually straight away?

Thanks.

Stewie Mac

my anniversary date was five days ago, no sign of the bonus points yet... I will let you know when they hit, and specifically if they hit before the statement with the annual fee on it

Raffles

Takes about a month, I believe, post paying the fee

I've never heard of anyone due it who didn't get it and had to fight

You can still cancel and get a prorata fee refund.

louie-m

I asked Amex to confirm I had hit the £15,000 spend and was told this:

"I am glad to confirm that 7,500 Bonus Membership Rewards as you have met the spend threshold of £15,000.

This Bonus Points will be issued to you August statement".

The card fee was charged on 24 July (my last statement date) - I'll confirm whether the bonus points arrive on 24 August.

Rome77

My recent experience: Annual fee charged on the 26th of June, 7.500 bonus MR credited on the 15th of July.

louie-m

My bonus points have arrived today.

MrGatch

Thanks for all of the replies ^

Stewie Mac

Bonus points hit today, as did the paper statement with the annual fee. From experience, there's no problem in cancelling in the first month of the year and getting a full refund, so long as nothing else is outstanding on the account. Now, is there any sign of any conversion bonus in the next three weeks...

BAfave

Had only been using card for certain spend i.e. keeping my BA spend on BA Prem Amex but just noticed I am £920 short of the £15,000 spend with 5 days to go.

Do you think Amex may honour the 7500 points if i keep the card? rather than call and cancel it?

Frenske

Well I would think the bonus is automatically added when qualified, so computer says no.
I guess you can phone them up and suggest you might cancel the card since there is no incentive for keeping it. I'm too far from qualifying for bonus; getting the gold credit card did not help. At least I have the 3000MR points.

Raffles

Quick refundable BA flight (£15 to cancel) or a refundable hotels.com booking (no fee) would do the trick.

Warning, though. Because the refund will be in your new card year, it will increase the amount you need to spend next year to trigger the bonus, as it is based in net spend not gross spend, ie adjusting for refunds.

BAfave

How does the hotels.com booking work?

tangey

Speaking of bonuses, I passed my SPG bonus spend on the 5th of december. No 20K bonus posted (1K posted for being referred). secure emailed, and eventually got a response that it'll post on my March statement, and that
T&C states
"You will receive 20,000 bonus Starpoints when you spend and charge £2,000 within the first three months of Card membership. Please note that it can take up to two months for bonus Starpoints to be awarded to your account."

That's not entirely clear whether it means 2 months after £2K is charged, or up to 2 months after the 3 months.

Looking at the gold card T&C I see it is clearly spelt out.
"If you are approved for an account and spend £2,000 on purchases on the account within the first three months, 20,000 bonus Membership Rewards® points will be awarded shortly after the end of the three months. "

That terminology looks new to me. The plat card doesn't have that wording.

21H21J

My SPG bonus posted on the same statement as the £1k spend along with the referral bonus.

Perhaps Amex are getting wise to the smash and grab mentality being advocated, and are holding back a few months before giving the bonus points.

Raffles

If you book a 'pay on departure' ie Best Flex hotel room at hotels.com, the cheeky beggers make you pay them for it immediately - they then sit on your cash and pay the hotel at the time of stay.

Such payments are obviously refundable, and when you cancel your room the money goes back with indecent haste.